The Dream and Its Construction:

Mizrahi-Arab Cooperation to Combat Discrimination[1]

Yifat Bitton

Writing about equality and justice must never be confined to theory. It should always aim at achieving concrete justice. When I delve into this kind of writing, I envision the relationship between various groups positioned unequally vis-à-vis one another: men and women, whites and blacks, and others. In the Israeli context the list of unequal social power relations usually includes Jews and Arabs as well. This distinction is, of course, very important for Israeli society and for the peace project it seeks to pursue with its non-Israeli Palestinian neighbors. However, employing this Jewish-Arab binary diverts our attention from another distinction, one that is in many ways covert: the distinction between the Mizrahi and Ashkenazi groups within the Jewish community. The Mizrahi group, I contend, has the greatest potential for generating a meaningful Jewish-Arab link that would enable the establishment of fairness between Jews and Arabs, both within Israel, in the form of civil equality, and outside Israel, in the form of political peace between two nations. In this essay I aim to shed light on the fascinating convergence between Mizrahim and Arabs in Israel and its potential to be applied to the legal discourse so as to promote fairness between these groups, primarily by means of joint invocation of the principle of equality before the law.

The principle of equality is the primary legal means for achieving social justice between various population groups.[2] The common perception is that this principle is meant to allow a particular group to demonstrate that it is discriminated against on the basis of its unique characteristics. Successful establishment of a discrimination claim enables the group to achieve legal recognition of its plight, a plight emanating from that discrimination, and, accordingly, to obtain redress. This is the basic structure the legal system offers to those who bring their discrimination-based plight before the law. This familiar and common structure of the principle of equality in liberal societies is perceived as unequivocally positive, having the potential to promote the good and certainly having no potential to produce any harm. Still, despite its positive image, the principle of equality is considered imperfect, in the sense that it has a limited ability to reallocate resources and in the sense that its impact does not extend beyond providing legal remedies. For instance, notwithstanding the power the legal principle of equality has to prevent members of group A from discriminating against members of group B, it nevertheless lacks the ability to make members of group A like members of group B.

Contrary to the prevailing liberal view of the evident positivity of the equality principle, I contend that employing it in its customary form generates deeply negative outcomes that may even worsen the condition of groups that seek legal redress for the discrimination they encounter. Thus the principle can be viewed, at the least, as generating both negative and positive outcomes. This realization renders the legal equality principle one that merits a review of its theoretical and practical foundations and their ability to promote equality in a liberal society.[3]

Let us begin with the most basic contradiction the equality principle entails: it prompts each group to become entrenched in its unique characteristics as a legally effective way to present its claim of discrimination. That is, it requires the group to adopt three patently illiberal modes of action:  the group distinguishes itself from the rest of the population and establishes the need to defend its own interests as distinct from the general need to protect the interests of people as a “common good”; the group entrenches itself within identifiable boundaries that it sees as rigid and therefore as uniquely characterizing its members; and in the act of distinguishing itself, the group actually departs from the larger population to which it belongs, as well as from other uniquely distinguishable groups. The group acts so in order to highlight its claims and gain precedence in the allotment of the relevant resources. Pursuing equality in this way results in the destruction of both the sense of social cohesion and the belief in it. It incites minority groups to attack each other whenever they compete for the limited resources designated for them by the hegemonic group. However, beyond this practical pitfall, pursuing equality while drifting away from society cuts off, in the theoretical sense, the very branch that supports the discriminated group’s demand for equality, according to which the principle of equality is relevant only in a society that cherishes and demonstrates a sense of mutual responsibility and social cohesion between its members.

Another basic contradiction the principle imposes on groups seeking to apply it in their favor is that to construct the claim of discrimination, the group must distinguish itself as different from and inferior to the hegemonic group, while simultaneously proving that it is actually similar to it and therefore entitled to the same benefits or goods.

To this complex cauldron I want to add another ingredient, nonlegal on the face of it but with weighty legal significance: the sociopolitical context in which the principle of equality is applied. Using the case of Israel, I will show how the characteristics of this principle hinder cooperation between the various groups within the country, and in the case before us, between the Mizrahi and Palestinian groups. These groups, which appear to the lay observer as arrayed according to some political-historical-cultural scheme, are actually frameworks created with the participation, albeit indirect, of the law and preserved as such with its assistance. As a formulated, explicit tool used primarily by the hegemonic system, the law is a significant player in the shaping of our social structures and thus contributes to their perpetuation. It is exactly for this reason that the law also serves as an important tool to be used in dismantling power relations, yet sometimes, in the course of doing so, it collapses into itself.[4] My aim in this essay is precisely this: to dismantle the social power relations in Israel, primarily those epitomized in the Mizrahi-Arab-Ashkenazi triangle, and thus dismantle the residual negative effect the mechanism of legal equality has of limiting and endangering joint struggles for equality. To that end I seek to articulate a dream and to create in this essay not the model for its shattering but rather the model for its realization.

Israeli society is stratified along several axes that exist in every society, including race, gender, nationality, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, and disability. Although this stratification is similarly effective in different countries, the national and ethnic rifts in Israel are unique and have distinct meanings. Accordingly, I contend, the Israeli pattern of discrimination along these axes requires that, to eradicate discrimination, the principle of equality be applied to it in a unique way.

Unlike in other countries, in Israel discrimination on the basis of nationality relates to the unique model on which both the civil identity of the country’s inhabitants and the identity of the state itself are built. Israel’s identity as a Jewish and democratic state, as its basic laws have defined it for two decades, gives the axis of discrimination on the basis of nationality a special status.[5] The Arabs, clearly not of Jewish nationality, are actually the most relevant reference group in Israel for illustrating discrimination on the basis of nationality. On the face of it, their belonging to the Arab nation is what distinguishes them from the Jewish group and clarifies their status as a weakened minority group. The adherence to the motif of nationality as the basis of discrimination against Arabs in Israel can be clearly explained in terms of the cultural-political context of Israeli society and is manifest in formal legal terms. In cultural-political terms the Arab group of citizens of the State of Israel is actually part of the Palestinian group that was conquered in 1948 and that clung to its Arab national, at times even anti-Zionist, identity. Thus, this group’s members are part of both the noncitizen group of the inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza and the group of Israeli citizens. This anomaly requires recognition of this group’s distinct, separate, and discriminated-against status. In the civil context, in a state that serves as the nation-state of the Jewish people, this group will be defined, naturally, as discriminated against along the strongest axis possible for a group in a democratic state: the axis of nationality.[6] From a legal standpoint, instigating the struggle for equality along the national axis is, for the Arabs, preferable to doing so along other possibly applicable axes, such as religion. The religious axis would be less effective to use, because the various religious groups that make up the Arab group draw different levels of discrimination. Moreover, non-Arab Christians living in Israel are not subjected to the same experiences of discrimination that Arabs endure. Another basis for discrimination against Palestinians could be identified as their race. However, such a contention would fail, as it is clear to all that Jews and Arabs belong to the same Semitic race. Consequently, in struggling against discrimination the Arab group must define itself clearly as being distinct from the Jewish group. That is, it must show that apart from the shared motif of common citizenship—and even in this there is a distinction between Jewish and Arab types of citizenship[7]—the two groups have nothing in common.

Absurdly, as I made clear at the outset, it is the unequivocal difference between Arabs and Jews and the clear distinction between these groups that have enabled Arab citizens of Israel to wage a legal battle against discrimination that has gained significant, continuing achievements.[8] This is not to imply that the Israeli legal system has succeeded in eradicating discrimination against Arabs in Israel altogether; rather I am drawing attention to the fact that the Arab group’s struggles for equality have been regarded sympathetically by the courts in general and by the Supreme Court in particular, precisely because of its distinctness from the Jewish group.[9]

While nationality is well recognized both culturally and legally as an axis of discrimination in Israel—to the extent that even right-wing circles recognize the need to combat such discrimination against Arabs[10]—the axis of ethnicity-based discrimination is generally perceived as irrelevant to Israeli society. This means that Israeli society does not see itself, and is certainly not seen from the outside, as divided along lines of ethnicity, or, at least, it is not perceived as divided on the basis of ethnicity as the result of the continued existence of some mechanism of discrimination. To recap, it can no longer be denied that the sociolegal map of ethnic origin-based stratification in Israel suffers from a deep split along the entire length of Israeli society’s Mizrahi-Ashkenazi ethnic line. The era of denial, which prevailed for decades, ended primarily after Mizrahi scholars labored intensively over the last twenty years, using scientific methods to gather systematic information regarding these gaps and showing them to be irrefutable.[11] But the recognition of the existence of a clear, continuing ethnic disparity has not ended the denial of the discrimination against Mizrahim in Israel. Instead of Israeli society relating to these ethnic gaps within its Jewish community as resulting from discrimination and therefore requiring the use of tools that prohibit discrimination, the public is leaning toward the argument that these gaps emanate from social behavior other than discrimination. At best it is argued that the ethnic gaps originated in the past, in the days of the Mapai Party’s rule in Israel, and that what we see today are, at most, its traces. According to this argument, because the premeditated discrimination has ended, there is no need to deal with it; instead one must wait patiently for the natural “healing” process to unfold with the inevitable expected disappearance of this past discrimination’s effects. At worst it is argued that the source of the gaps lies in the “cultural deficiency” of the Mizrahim that prevents them from investing in developing the educational skills necessary to succeed in a competitive and successful society such as that of Israel.[12]

Naturally, the denial of discrimination against Mizrahim at the political-cultural level is reflected in the legal system as well. First, no formal legal framework in Israel that prohibits discrimination uses the phrase “ethnic origin.” This lacuna is highlighted by the fact that all the other “classic” categories of discrimination mentioned above, and many others, are anchored in one of the anti-discrimination laws.[13] Moreover, in contrast to Israel, to the best of my knowledge, no other country in the world with a democratic judicial system that prohibits discrimination omits ethnic origin as the basis of a prohibition of discrimination under its jurisdiction. The omission in Israel is thus a local pathology, which is especially troubling in light of the proven existence of discrimination against the Mizrahi population in Israel for the past six and a half decades—that is, since the establishment of the state.

A summary of the patterns of discrimination and the prohibiting of discrimination against Mizrahim and Arabs in Israel reveals two distant, seemingly unconnected phenomena: the Arabs are discriminated against on the basis of their national origin, and the principle of equality enables them to request legal redress on this ground, whereas the Mizrahim are discriminated on the basis of ethnicity, but the lack of recognition of this basis makes it difficult for them to present their case in court and to receive remedy for such discrimination.[14] This is, therefore, a classic situation in which each group holds fast to its unique characteristics in its attempt to prove that these characteristics are responsible for its inferior status. But this entrenchment divides the two groups and weakens their claims. Uniting the two could instead lead to the creation of a “third space,” in which, by means of the proximity and similarity between them, they could create a platform for changing their social status in a way that has never been attempted in Israel. It would involve adopting an innovative and subversive stance, seeking to deconstruct the fences that have traditionally separated the groups and to create a new coalition in their struggles against discrimination.

The Arabs in Israel are in the seemingly “comfortable” situation—insofar as one can speak of comfort in relation to discrimination—of basing their demands for equality on the ground of their nationality, which is a recognized and protected ground in Israeli law. But they also pay a high price for using it: because the issue of their nationality has substantial political implications, they risk having their claims perceived as political rather than civil.[15] This means that when the Arab group claims discrimination at the civil level, with the aim of receiving treatment as citizens with equal rights for its members, it actually uses the national context as the ground, and this context has loaded political and historical meanings. These meanings make it impossible to consider the civil context in a “pure” manner that is devoid of the politics of Jewish-Arab relations, with all its history of bloodshed and the current state of conflict, which renders the Arab group’s struggle political rather than civil, thereby partly delegitimizing it.

A clear example of this problem is the struggle of Israel’s Arab population for Arabic signage. Arabic is recognized as an official language in Israel, but in the Israeli space there is a persistent refusal to use it. Many Jews see Arabic not only as a threat to the dominance of the Hebrew language in the public space, which makes simple and clear communication between the citizens of the state possible, but also as a threat to Hebrew’s right to exist as the symbol of the Jewish people’s right to exist in Israel. The Supreme Court seems to understand that as well.[16] The recent attempt to ensure, in a basic law, that Arabic is not an official language in Israel, even in light of its shamefully minimal use, is also telling.[17] All these approaches are in accord with the widely held view that the Israeli space is actually a Jewish space, and thus any attempt to fill it with Arab signs, even if they are totally civic in intent, is perceived as posing a threat to the Jewish nature of Israel and encounters political resistance.[18]

Recently we saw another example of this crude mixing of domains in the struggle for the right of bedouin to settle in the Negev. The bedouin population in Israel views the Prawer Plan to arrange the settlement of bedouin in the Negev as harmful and as stripping them of their rights to large tracts of land there, and many bedouin are therefore strongly opposed to it. As part of the resistance, there were several stormy protests. This struggle was, of course, purely civil, in the sense that it emerged as a conflict over the question of ownership of property and the nature of settlement and the civil life of the Negev bedouin, with their unique social practices of land acquisition. But the protests were seen by “the Jewish side” as demonstrations against the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state and as undermining its very foundations. The struggle was portrayed in terms of a question concerning the national identity of the state—and of the Negev, which was viewed as a region undergoing a “hostile takeover” from the Jews by the bedouin. This view was expressed not only as a theory but also in practice, in the worst way, when the Israel Security Agency—the agency entrusted with state security against Palestinian subversion—became involved in the demonstrations and interrogated the leaders of the civil struggle against the plan, demanding that they report to their offices.[19]

A study of these examples enables us to describe the Arabs as being in a formal comfort zone in terms of the principle of equality, but in a catastrophe zone in terms of the context in which their claim for equality is raised. In contrast to the Arabs, the Mizrahim are in a problematic situation in that they have failed to present convincing grounds for their argument of inequality because ethnicity is not understood as being a basis for discrimination in Israel. However, in addition to this difficulty, it is clear that Mizrahim, in presenting their civil claims, are not suspected of political subversion against the state. Thus, in the few cases in which Mizrahim have brought their claims of discrimination to the courts, no political issue has arisen, at least not on the surface, and the discussion of the subject has been concrete and has dealt with the discrimination in the given area. True, in most cases these claims were dismissed, but that was due to the courts’ failure to recognize the distinct condition of Mizrahim as a social group that suffers discrimination in Israel.[20] Moreover, on the rare occasion that a claim of systematic discrimination was accepted in a ruling, as in the case of Michel Malka—which was the first to determine that Mizrahim are discriminated against in the Israeli labor market—it was evident that it was easy for the court to make broad assertions regarding discrimination against Mizrahim in Israel without shaking things up beyond the realm of the workplace and the civil recognition that discrimination takes place there.[21]

We can summarize by saying that both groups are situated simultaneously in “catastrophe” zones and in “comfort” zones in a way that makes it difficult for both to conduct their struggles for equality independently of each other. By joining forces they could neutralize this difficulty and mount a struggle for equality that would be more effective for both of them, in terms of its outcome, and also more appropriate for both, in the sense of their joining together and creating a connection to achieve a “common good.” I will now consider the proposal that they join forces.

A careful examination of the means of discrimination against Mizrahim and Arabs in Israel reveals that it occurs on two levels: overt and covert. This is not to say that the discrimination involves sophisticated mechanisms of conspiracy and concealment of “covert” and “overt” truths but rather that stereotypical, racist biases against the two groups are activated in the discriminatory practices against them, and they constitute the foundation of this discrimination. Therefore, identifying this foundation will make possible a more effective struggle against the discrimination from which these two groups suffer. This is the truth that is easy to understand: to fight an illness we must first identify its cause.

What is the foundation that links the two groups, on the one hand, and what is the basis of discrimination by the hegemonic society in Israel, on the other? My simple answer is, “Arabness.” Arabness, not in its national sense, but in its cultural sense. Arabness in the sense of what one may define as “the culture in the Middle East that competes with the hegemonic European culture.” Arab culture as a typically “Oriental” culture that is seen by the seemingly enlightened West as inferior, barbarian, and dangerous to proper, high-quality human development. It is a culture that threatens European culture, which is perceived as enlightened, desirable, and crucial for the advancement and strengthening of liberalism. Edward Said, of course, described this discrimination as an expression of Israeli Jewish colonialism toward Arab-Palestinians.[22] In this sense his work keeps the discrimination against Arabs in Israel within the framework of the national conflict. In contrast Ella Shohat points to the Mizrahim as the Jewish recipients of the Orientalism and Eurocentrism that Zionism expresses, and thus she returns the emphasis to the Arab-culture context of the discrimination.[23] The Mizrahi Jews are discriminated against, she claims, because they are from Arab countries, and their cultural identity is that of Arabs despite their being Jewish in terms of their national identity. This argument was made more comprehensive when Yehouda Shenhav-Shaharabani established the notion of the culturally Eurocentric character of Zionism.[24] His argument is that Zionism is based on three motifs: Jewish-national, Jewish-religious, and European-ethnic. This explicit statement by Shenhav-Shaharabani enables us to better understand the foundations of the overt and covert discrimination against the two groups. For the Arabs, the basis for overt discrimination is national, whereas the covert basis is ethnic. For the Mizrahim, the basis for equality is national, and therefore their discrimination is denied or it is presented as based on other, specific, foundations, whereas the covert basis for discrimination is also their Arab ethnicity.

In other words, if we return to the two levels of discrimination against the two groups, we find this: discrimination against the Arabs is not always linked to the political motif of the national conflict. In this sense, an Arab woman is not always discriminated against because of her nationality. For the most part, she is discriminated against for her Arab ethnicity. For Mizrahim, however, discrimination will generally be denied, and the discriminatory treatment will be justified on personal grounds (her lack of competence to fill the position she did not receive, his unsuitability to the dance club he was not allowed to enter, and so on), when in fact they are being discriminated against on the basis of their unrecognized Arabness. This common element of identity and discrimination could be a “third space” for the two groups, a place where people who live in a framework of coercion and discrimination create a new and complex identity, different from that with which they started the journey toward subjugation.[25] The third space would enable the two groups to conceptualize the components of their identity and the basis of the discrimination against them anew and to struggle more effectively for equality.

Now that the common factor between the two groups and the basis for the discrimination against them has been found, and a third space has been created in which they can come together for discursive and activist action, one must think about how they can design their struggle for equality together. I propose that they identify the shared interests of the group members who are harmed, directly or indirectly, on the grounds of their Arab identity and that they try to band together in the struggle to protect their mutual interests. In legal terms such a struggle is likely to remove the veil of “nationality” as a basis for discrimination against Arabs and to allow the discussion to remain within the civil, rather than the political, context. On the Mizrahi side the struggle would likely expose the existence of discrimination against Mizrahim and enable it to be established in the Knesset and in court more easily, in that the same discrimination is aimed at the Arabs, a group with respect to which the discrimination is clearer and more familiar. The advantages will not be limited to the legal level. It is clear that uniting the groups will lead to a change in the public atmosphere and to connections between the groups that can lead to a new system of power and social relations in Israeli society. Even though this vision goes beyond the legal vision, I deeply believe it can be realized, over the course of years of shared struggle, despite the opposition it may arouse.[26]

To clarify my proposal, I present here a few examples of this unifying legal constellation in various areas. Some of these examples involve actions that have already worked or are now working in the field, and some have the potential for development.

At the most basic, practical level, Mizrahim and Palestinians in Israel share geographic and cultural space that is, for the most part, segregated from that of the hegemonic group. On the geographic plane one can point to the southern and northern peripheries of Israel as being made up primarily of development towns and Arab localities. The two groups are also overrepresented in the most impoverished towns and cities in Israel.[27] In addition, mixed Arab-Jewish cities in Israel—such as Jaffa, Lod, Ramle, and Acre—traditionally represented in the poorer localities, are made up primarily of Mizrahi and Arab populations, living side by side. Consequently, the interests of the population in Israel’s periphery are likely to be shared by both groups. Thus, for example, one can imagine a joint struggle of these groups to receive health services equal to those offered in the center of the country, where most residents are Ashkenazim. The Ashkenazi group, parts of which also live in economically well-established localities that are located in the “rural periphery,” can also play a positive and important role in such a struggle. However, other, primarily economic, means they possess can help them resolve these issues more easily.[28] And yet there are struggles that will be devoted only to development towns and Arab localities. Thus, for example, only these localities will participate in the struggle over jurisdiction for the purpose of collecting municipal taxes, which ensures economic strength for the locality’s inhabitants. Historically, in the allocation of jurisdiction in the periphery, only development towns and Arab localities have been denied lands suitable for residential purposes and future development in proportion to the number of their inhabitants. Consequently, these localities also routinely suffer from cumulative budgetary deficits that lead, once every few years, to their collapse and the nonpayment of their workers’ salaries. In such situations they require emergency aid from the central government, and their dependence on the hegemonic group and their power relations with it remain unchanged. A crisis of this type in 2004 led a group of lawyers to persuade Mizrahi localities and Arab localities to coordinate their legal efforts.[29] The state, which usually quashes the struggle of these individual localities for economic independence, for the first time had to relate to them together. Once the Jewish localities joined together in the struggle, the government could no longer make its usual argument that the Arab localities have a “cultural mentality” of not paying municipal debts. On the other hand, the court could suddenly see the crisis in the Jewish localities not as an anecdotal case of irresponsible local government but rather as part of a mechanism of discrimination against this group that causes them, time after time, to sink into such impossible debt.

Another example pertains to the cultural level, where the two populations can also be seen as similar. The groups’ shared Arabness can be traced to their shared language (which is unfortunately becoming extinct on the Jewish side), shared music, and in general, recognition of the importance of the development of Arab culture in Israel, which suffers from undervisibility and underfunding. Take, for instance, the annual report of the Coalition for Equality in the Allocation of Governmental Support for Culture, which exposed the Ministry of Culture’s ridiculous, yet systematic, allocations for non-Western culture. Note that this does not mean that the Arabs and Mizrahim will demand one allocation for their varied cultures; rather, their demands can be unified to obtain significant sums for preserving and developing Arab-based, non-European culture in Israel.[30]

The above-mentioned examples are but a partial demonstration of the potential that cooperation between the two groups holds. Apart from the spheres of geography and culture, there are many important joint struggles that can be found to be equally appealing to both groups. Consider, for example, public housing in Israel. This basic welfare need is utterly neglected by the government and suffers from what is, to say the least, unsatisfactory state attention, to the point where government seems to want to frustrate the ideological foundations of this right and rid itself altogether of what it deems more a social burden than a constitutional right. Most of the residents in public housing in Israel, and those entitled to it, are of Mizrahi or Arab origin. Thus, this struggle can be reconceptualized in the third space as a response to the stereotyping of these citizens as “irresponsible,” “good-for-nothing,” and “lazy” people who should be held personally responsible for their lack of housing and are therefore not entitled to receive public housing from the state.

I realize that many will consider my proposal a pipe dream. The Mizrahi population has traditionally and tribally voted for right-wing parties, which preach splitting off and separating from the Arabs in Israel and act to perpetuate the de facto, and sometimes even de jure, discrimination against them. Consequently, some opponents are likely to opine, it is difficult to forge agreement for true and significant cooperation between Mizrahim and Palestinians. Moreover, how will Mizrahi Jews agree to “give up” their privileged identity and adopt an identity—that of “the enemy”—that exposes them to even more severe discrimination? From the Palestinian side, the main anticipated opposition may derive from the fear that such cooperation will lead to cooptation—namely, that the struggle will undergo “Judaization,” “normalization,” and depoliticization as long as it is portrayed as solely civil. I do not have the space to discuss these arguments individually or as profoundly as I would wish. Instead, I will challenge opponents by saying that on the ground reality proves the opposite. It proves that where a joint struggle is needed, it simply happens; the members of the groups feel an unmediated, natural closeness rather than hostility, and this enables them to act together. Clear examples of this can be found in the joint struggle of the Jewish and Arab municipal employees during the local municipalities’ economic crisis, which befell them in 2004. The establishment of the Jurisdiction Forum for Mizrahi and Arab organizations, to persuade the Ministry of the Interior to correct their localities’ areas of jurisdiction, is another example. Even more significant is the decision by the inhabitants of the development town of Yeruham to allocate part of the town’s municipal area for the construction of a daycare center for children from nearby unrecognized bedouin villages, because the state does not recognize the right of these children to an organized, daily educational framework. The Public Housing Team, which helps groups of Mizrahim and Arabs and involves the residents themselves in the struggles of their compeers, regardless of their origin, is further proof of that.

In the shared vision for Palestinians and Mizrahim in Israel, there is great potential for the reduction of civil inequality within the state and for the promotion of understanding between the Arab and Jewish peoples at a broader political level. The struggle of the two groups for equality will challenge the limited and divisive mechanism of antidiscrimination law in the current judicial system and will provide a new, dynamic, and unique space within the Israeli space for these excluded groups. To this end the groups do not have to adopt a uniform identity but instead must create empathy between them on the basis of their common ground: their Arabness. Arabness, which is excluded from the Israeli space, requires egalitarian, just treatment. Such treatment can also lead to better understanding and sympathy between the two peoples in a way that will build a bridge between them for peace in the near future. In this sense it is my firm opinion that the Mizrahi-Arab connection is the only significant key Israeli society holds for achieving peace with the Palestinians.[31] This connection can develop in a very narrow framework and give rise from there to this real and attainable possibility of peace.

Notes:

[1] This title is a paraphrase of the expression “the dream and its shattering,” which expresses hope that has been dashed. I am using it to revive hope in the dream of a life of cooperation and peace between Jews and Palestinians. I wish to thank dock-ument editor Zohar Kohavi and Yofi Tirosh for their insights and help in preparing this essay for publication.

[2] The “principle of equality” constitutes the ethical basis of justice, as Plato explained clearly. Nevertheless, in this essay I deal with the legal meaning of this principle.

[3] In this essay I am not undertaking the task of rethinking the theoretical framework for promoting equality in liberal society. My modest aim at this stage is to indicate how problematic the principle is.

[4] I view antidiscrimination laws as the best available legal tool for combating discrimination, given the inherent limitations of the law as a means of achieving social, and more particularly, racial justice. See Robert M. Cover, “The Supreme Court, 1982 Term—Foreword: Nomos and Narrative,” Harvard Law Review 97, no. 1 (1983); and Cover, “Violence and the Word,” Yale Law Journal 95, no. 8 (1986).

[5] The official legal definition of the State of Israel as a “Jewish and democratic” state was made only in the basic laws that completed the composition of Israel’s informal constitution, two decades ago, in clause A1 of each of the following: Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty (Israel) and Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation (Israel). Prior to that, there was no legal framework that defined the state as “Jewish,” apart from the recognition of it as the homeland of the Jewish people in the Declaration of Independence. It is not for no reason that in right-wing circles voices have recently arisen demanding to anchor, in unique and targeted legislation, the State of Israel as a “Jewish” state.

[6] According to various scholars, this axis, because of its great power, turns Israel into a state that is not democratic but, rather, ethnocratic. See this definition and its conceptual roots in Oren Yiftachel and Sandy Kedar, “Al otzsma ve-adama: Mishtar ha-mekarkein ha-Yisraeli” [On power and land: The Israeli lands regime], Theoria u-bikoret [Theory and criticism] 16 (2000): 69–70.

[7] For details regarding differences between the “fragile” citizenship of the Arab group as opposed to the “durable” citizenship of the Jewish group, see Ilan Saban, “Ezrahkhut u-mahalachim le-shehikata: Mishpat, mussar, ve-takhshivei to’elet be-nogea le-hatza’ot ‘Yisrael Beitenu’ le-hilufei shtahim me-ukhlasim u-le-hatnayat ha-zekhut livhor u-shevu’at emunim” [Citizenship and attempts to erode it: Law, ethics, and utilitarian calculations regarding the Jewish Home’s proposals for exchanges of populated territories and for making the right to vote conditional on a loyalty oath], Ha-praklit [The lawyer] 51 (2010).

[8] This is recognized even by those who criticize the change as insufficient. See Raef Zreik, “Palestine, Apartheid, and the Rights Discourse,” Journal of Palestine Studies 34, no. 1 (2004): 72–73; and Yousef Jabareen, “Constitution Building and Equality in Deeply-Divided Societies: The Case of the Arab Minority in Israel,” Wisconsin International Law Journal 26, no. 2 (2008).

[9] The impressive list of successes can be found on the web site of Adallah, Israel’s most prominent Arab minority rights organization, which displays them for all to see, and all of which, in one way or another, rely on the principle of equality.

[10] Thus, for example, right-wing Minister of Finance Naftali Bennett made a clear announcement that he intends to start a campaign to combat discrimination against Arabs in the Israeli labor market.

[11] For a succinct but rich description of the range of areas in which there are gaps between ethnic groups, see Yifat Bitton, “Finally, Our Own Brown! (?),” Israel Law Review 45, no. 2 (2012): 270–273.

[12] See the variety of reasons for this in ibid., 283.

[13] See, for example, the long, detailed, and seminal list in Article 3 of the Prohibition of Discrimination in Products, Services and Entry into Places of Entertainment and Public Places Law, 2000, which includes the prohibition against discrimination “on the grounds of race, religion or religious group, nationality, country of origin, sex, sexual orientation, political views, party membership, personal status or parenthood.” A similar phenomenon exists in the Employment (Equal Opportunities) Law, 1988, which in Article 2 prohibits discrimination against workers and job applicants on the basis of “their sex, sexual orientation, marital status, pregnancy, fertility treatments, in vitro fertility treatments, parenthood, age, race, religion, nationality, country of origin, view, political party, or service in the reserves, being called up for reserve duty, or anticipated service in the reserves.”

[14] Over the last decade this has become more possible through the Prohibition of Discrimination in Products, Services and Entry into Places of Entertainment and Public Places Law, which allows persistent judges, using creative interpretation, to relate to it as conferring protection against discrimination to all people who manage to prove it, thereby rendering it relevant to Mizrahim as well. In addition, recently the Labor Court, in the case of Michel Malka, explicitly recognized discrimination against Mizrahim in the labor market in Israel. See Malka v. Israeli Aviation Industry Ltd., TA 3816-09, (August 2, 2013).

[15] For this distinction and for support of liberal equality primarily with regard to political rather than civil rights, see Reva B. Siegel, “Why Equal Protection No Longer Protects: The Evolving Forms of Status-Enforcing State Action,” Stanford Law Review 49, no. 5 (1997), which argues that antidiscrimination laws were aimed at bettering African Americans’ civil and political rights but not their social rights.

[16] Meital Pinto, “Who Is Afraid of Language Rights?,” in The Multicultural Challenge in Israel, ed. Ohad Nachtomi and Avi Sagi (Boston: Academic Studies Press, 2009), 43.

[17] The reference is to a bill proposed by Avi Dichter in the 18th Knesset, which the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, blocked.

[18] See Mikhail Kreini, “Al ha-‘shelanu’: Rav-tarbutiyut ba-heksher ha-Aravi-Yehudi” [About the ‘ours’: Multiculturalism in the Arab-Jewish context], Iyunei mishpat [Tel Aviv University law review] 27 (2003/2004): 71.

[19] The involvement of the National Security Agency is implied by the demand, made by human rights organizations to the police commissioner and to the state attorney, that the summoning for interrogation of activists against the plan cease immediately. “Adalla Ve-ha-aguda: Ha-mishtara ve-ha-shabak ‘mazhirim’ p’eilim leval yafginu neged hok Praver” [ACRI and Adalah: The Police and the Shin Bet “warns” Activists not to Demonstrate aginst the Praver Plan], ACRI, accessed June 22, 2014, http://www.acri.org.il/he/29232.

[20] Yifat Bitton, “Mizrahim ba-mishpat: Ha-ein Ke-yesh” [Mizrahim and law: Absence as existence], Mishpatim 41 (2011).

[21] Malka v. Israeli Aviation Industry Ltd.

[22] Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage Books, 1979).

[23] Ella Shohat, Ha-kolnoa ha-yisraeli: Historia ve-ideologia [Israeli cinema: History and ideology] (Tel Aviv: Breirot Press, 1991). I purposely refrain from dealing with the argument of Said and Shohat, which I find problematic, that Zionism is a colonialist project.

[24] Yehouda Shenhav, The Arab Jews: A Postcolonial Reading of Nationalism, Religion, and Ethnicity (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2006).

[25] This conceptual “space” is most often associated with Homi Bhabha’s work in the field of colonialism/postcolonialism. Homi K. Bhabha, The Location of Culture (Oxford: Routledge, 1994), 37. I refrain, however, from adopting his specific notion of a “third space” position as pertaining more to the dyad of colonized-colonizer. My notion is more of a “third space” without the third parties. It has less to do with being a space of constant dynamics and creativity of identity and more to do with being a political, action-intended place. I do, however, accept Bhabha’s emphasis on the agency of the colonized in this respect. See Ilan Kapoor, “Acting in a Tight Spot: Homi Bhabha’s Postcolonial Politics,” New Political Science 25, no. 4 (2003), which interprets Bhabha’s perceptions of agency.

[26] The opposition may arise from both groups, each for its own reasons. I will discuss this briefly later in the article.

[27] See the data that the government publishes regarding the localities in the various localities, “Table A: Local Councils and Municipalities,” Central Bureau of Statistics, accessed June 22, 2014,

http://www.cbs.gov.il/hodaot2004/13_04_22ta.pdf.

[28] Thus, for example, one can imagine that all the inhabitants of the periphery will want to have a hospital built near them, but the more established localities will have more financial resources for developing better health services, and they will also have greater access to health services provided in the center of the country.

[29] Eyal Sternberg, Clarice Harbon, and I were the lawyers in the petition, Abutbul v. Ministry of Social Affairs P.D., High Court of Justice 962/04, 58(6) 471 (2004).

[30] And indeed, two petitions have been presented to the High Court of Justice on the basis of that report, by the Coalition, which is an umbrella organization of Mizrahi cultural nonprofits, and by Mussawa, an organization that defends the rights of the Arab minority in Israel.

[31] I am not alone in thinking this. It seems that others also see it as correct. See Franklin H. Adler, “Israel’s Mizrahim: ‘Other’ Victims of Zionism or a Bridge to Regional Reconciliation?,” Macalester International 23, no. 1 (2009): 170.